BELGRADE, July 27 (Hina) - Dragan Mariscanin, a leader of Yugoslav President Vojislav Kostunica's Democratic Party of Serbia (DSS), on Saturday announced that the party would fight by "all democratic means" against a decision on the
exclusion of the DSS from the ruling coalition DOS and the Serbian parliament.
BELGRADE, July 27 (Hina) - Dragan Mariscanin, a leader of Yugoslav
President Vojislav Kostunica's Democratic Party of Serbia (DSS),
on Saturday announced that the party would fight by "all democratic
means" against a decision on the exclusion of the DSS from the
ruling coalition DOS and the Serbian parliament. #L#
Serbia's DOS alliance formally expelled Kostunica's party on
Friday evening at a session in Novi Sad.
The DOS leadership also decided to strip the DSS deputies in the
Serbian parliament of their mandates as lawmakers.
"In May we assessed that the DSS left the ruling coalition on its
own, and now this assessment is transformed into a decision," a
leader of Social Democrats of Vojvodina, Nenad Canak, said after
last night's session.
The head of the DOS parliamentary bench in the Serbian assembly,
Cedomir Jovanovic, announced that the decision on ousting DSS
representatives from parliamentary benches would most probably be
carried out the following week.
Last month the DOS leadership moved to strip deputies of
Kostunica's party in the Serbian parliament of their mandates as
lawmakers, saying they had delayed reforms by failing to turn up for
debates.
On Friday the Yugoslav Constitutional Court upheld an appeal lodged
by Kostunica's party against the DOS' motion, and said the deputies
could return to the benches.
The DOS regards the federal constitutional court's ruling as not
valid, explaining that the federal court has no authority to decide
in this matter. The coalition cites an example when the same court
proclaimed itself not competent to arbitrate in the case when three
deputies of a regional party were to be kicked out from the Serbian
assembly in 1997.
A judge of the Serbian Constitutional Court, Svetozar Ciplic, said
the decision about mandates of MPs at the level of the republic
(Serbia) was not within the jurisdiction of the federal (Yugoslav)
court.
No federal body can interfere in the legal organisation of the
Republic of Serbia, the judge said adding that the Serbian
constitutional court will decide on the same issue and that its
decision will be binding.
(hina) ms